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Transcript

Notes

Milton Leitenberg: We have asked all our... everyone that we interviewed, every Russian, and also from various East-European countries: Czechoslovaks, Poles, East Germans, Hungarians, one or two more... And this is much, much earlier, whether they knew the paragraphs, particularly paragraph one, and two, of the Biological Weapon[s] Convention. Did they know there was a Biological Weapon[s] Convention, which the Soviet Union signed in '75? And, more important, because Pravda did say there was such a thing in 1975, did they know what paragraph one and two said, which was that you're not allowed to do this?

Gennadiy N. Lepeshkin: Of course, we knew all of that. All of that was widely published, it was in the papers, in the special manuals, there were specific documents, we knew all of that very well, and everyone had read them.

Slava Paperno (interpreting): Yes, it was widely published. It was part of newspaper publications, and special directions, they all read it, and they all knew it.

Leitenberg: OK.

Lepeshkin: And there was a broad discussion in the press, about how the Soviet Union wasn't working on all of those problems... in all the major ones. But those who were involved directly with that knew that it wasn't the case.

Paperno (interpreting): There was widely published and publicized discussion in the media, that continued to claim that the Soviet Union was not doing any biological weapons work, but the insiders knew this to be different.

Leitenberg: And what did they say over coffee about that?

Lepeshkin: Well, which people are we talking about? People who were involved in that work took it very calmly. You know, if the government needs such work to be done, then, okay, we'll do it. And there wasn't a lot of soul-searching, I don't think.